“What’s In Your Wallet?” A Homily for the Twenty-First Sunday after Pentecost.

 Preached at All Saints, Collingwood, and Good Shepherd, Stayner, 13 October, 2024.

Readings (Yr B Proper 28B):  Job 23:1-9,16-17; Ps 22:1-15; Her 4:12-16; Mark 10:17-31 

Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” (Mark 10.23)

The rich man  in today’s gospel reading provoked an interesting discussion in our bible study last Wednesday as we veered from the bible to economics.   One person in our group said that she found it offensive that so much wealth in today’s society was concentrated in the hands of a few.  Another person, a recently retired banker, countered with his strongly held belief that if people had good ideas and worked hard, then they should be rewarded with wealth.  On the other hand, this gentleman did admit that today’s gospel did make him uncomfortable because he felt that Jesus was speaking directly to him.

Well, if today’s gospel made this gentleman uncomfortable, I daresay that he’s in good company.  Retired bankers, folks who rely on wealth managers, or even priests with a flash Audi in the garage may find that today’s gospel hits a nerve.  It’s often said that Jesus has far more to say about what we do with our money than about what we do with our bodies, and for those of us who have both money and a desire to follow Jesus, then we might well be made uncomfortable.   

“You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money[a] to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”  

This text is so challenging and that the temptation for each of us is to defuse it somehow, to redirect it or qualify it. So we might say,  Does this apply to all of us?  Our just to the wealthier among us?  To someone else?  It’s often argued that Jesus is saying this because he sees one specific defect (“you lack one thing”) in an otherwise good and pious man.   After all, the argument goes, Jesus doesn’t require other followers to sell all that they have.   Generally he says things like “Love God with all your heart and soul, and love your neighbour as you love yourself” (Mt 22:34-40).

So you can see how we might sidestep today’s gospel by saying that it only applied to a particular person with an inordinate attachment to his wealth, and surely doesn’t apply to the rest of us, at least not so stringently.  Or we might argue in self defence that scripture is all over the map when it comes to wealth.   Nowhere in the Old Testament does it say that you have to sell all you have.  After all, doesn’t the book of Job end with Job getting twice the possessions he had in the first place? (Job 42:10-17).

You can see how these sorts of appeals to verses in Scripture where Jesus is mercifully absent might absolve our consciences. In fact we could go on to play this game and say, well yes, the first Christians “would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need” (Acts 2.45), but that was because they expected Jesus to return at any moment.   After a few centuries, the church got on with things, which meant acquiring money and property, and without money and property, well, how can the church function?

Phew. We’ve managed to argue our way to a sensible place where wealth has a purpose in the church and we can be comfortable.  But notice how, to get there, we’ve had to distance ourselves from Jesus, and get away from his gaze.

Well, yes, to be sure, money and property can be helpful to our faith lives.  Last week, Joy and I were on retreat at the Ignatius Jesuit Centre near Guelph.  Over five days we spent time in silence and in prayer, we met with spiritual directors, and we learned how to listen carefully and attentively to what Jesus might be saying to us.   We enjoyed the five hundred acres of forest and farmland that the Centre sees itself as called to steward and protect.   At the end of our five days, the Director of the Centre spoke to us all and said, in effect, “I hope that you’ve been blessed by this place and what we’ve offered, but it costs money to do what we do, and if you could help us, we’d be very grateful”.

The Director certainly knew his audience.  After all, most of us had driven to Guelph in privately owned cars.   We all could take a week out of our lives and pay for that time.  We all wanted to draw closer to Jesus in our prayer lives and to appreciate the chance to be in a beautiful part of creation.  And now we were being asked to make this possible for others so they could also come closer to Jesus.  I’m sure I wasn’t the only one on that retreat  who added a small monthly charge to their credit card once I got home.

Now you all know that doing church costs money.  Thus Thanksgiving you got a mailing with the usual envelop for a seasonal gift plus a little envelope to help pay for the new defibrillator.  So you know this, dear saints.   You know that doing church, keeping a place open and functional so it can help others come to Jesus, does cost money. 

My point today is that once you come to Jesus, once you stand in his loving gaze, well that’s different and that’s private.   What happens then is between you and him.  To paraphrase scripture, Jesus knows how attached your heart issues to your treasure.  Spending time with Jesus can loosen your heart’s grip on your treasure, if you are willing to risk spending time with him. 

What happens next is between you and Jesus.

In one of his most powerful parables, the story of the Good Samaritan, there is a very specific mention of money.  When the Samaritan takes the injured man to an inn, he gives the innkeeper two denarii, a sum equivalent to two day’s wages, and then asks him to keep a record of any additional charges, to be paid on the Samaritan’s return (Luke 10.35).    Jesus never tells us if the Samaritan was wealthy and could easily afford this charity, or if he was poor and could ill-afford it.  The important thing, I think, is that he was willing to put his money to work for the kingdom of God.  The Samaritan knew that his money could not save him, and he also knew that his money could help others.   His heart had compassion, because his heart was not tied to his treasure.

This Thanksgiving, it is tempting to be a little complacent and to be grateful for the good things we enjoy.   There’s nothing wrong with gratitude, but can we also be thankful that we have opportunities to put our wealth to use to help those who may have less cause to be thankful?   David Penhale has written a good piece in our most recent newsletter on some of the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund’s projects, and that may give you some ideas.   Or, if a few dollars is all you can spare, you will certainly find something at Giant Tiger to put in our food pantry.   

Like the rich man in today’s parable, Jesus will meet each one of us on our life’s road.   He will always look at us with love, for guilt isn’t his way.   But his loving gaze can help us see if our hearts are locked away in our wallets, and can free us from that attachment. The encounter with Jesus may make us uncomfortable, but it will help align our hearts, and our spending, more closely with the kingdom of God.

With The Jesuits: Fall Scenes at the Retreat Centre

 This week I'm on retreat at the Ignatius Jesuit Centre just north of Guelph, ON, and popping online just long enough to share some of the natural beauty of this place as we edge into fall.    Besides being a spiritual destination for pilgrims and retreatants, the place is also a working farm and rents space to local growers and nurseries.

Things Visible and Invisible: A Sermon for St Michael and All Angels

Preached at St Luke’s Creemore, Anglican Diocese of Toronto, for the Regional Ministry of South Georgian Bay, 29 September, 2024, the Feast of St Michael and All Angels.

Readings for this Sunday:  Genesis 28:10-17; Psalm 103:19-22; Revelation 12:7-12; John 1:47-51

This Sunday is serving triple duty for us.

First, because tomorrow, Sept 30,  is the National Day of Truth and Reconciliation, it’s an opportunity for us to reflect on how we as God’s people have not always recognized our indigenous brothers and sisters as fellow Canadians and as fellow Christians.  As Bishop Andrew said in this week’s letter to the Diocese, we are called “to build together a country, and a Church, that – as we promised in our baptism – respects the dignity of every human being”. 

Second, today is an opportunity for us to celebrate the way we are starting to be church, which we call regional ministry.   Isn’t it wonderful to look around and see a full church, to see new people, and to think about how we can pool our resources, ideas, and talents?   As I’ve said this month, this is a new way of thinking that breaks with our old ideas of churches as siloes or as franchises.   One example of how we’ve been doing that lately is our Tuesday bible studies hosted by All Saints and ably led by Olivia Crowe from Prince of Peace, with a mixed group from both churches.   This shared project is a great example of how our churches can offer more when we work together.

Thirdly, today in the life of our church is the Feast of St Michael and All Angels.   While St Michael and All Angels would be a great name for our amazing regional clergy team, that’s not what we are celebrating today.    This feast, St Michael and All Angels, falls on Sept 29 in the church calendar and as our scripture readings have shown us, is an opportunity for us to think about those mysterious and wonderful creatures that we call angels, and also to think about their place in our faith and in Christian belief.

Now you may not think much about angels in your day to day faith life.   That wouldn’t be surprising, they don’t occur frequently in scripture, they aren’t mentioned in the creeds, and as part of the spiritual realm they are largely unseen and their role can seem unclear to us.   Indeed, for some of us, even for professing Christians, it may be difficult to believe in angels because we are so strongly influenced by rationalism and materialism.

And yet angels are everywhere in popular culture.   Think of:

Angels in the Outfield

Angels with Dirty Faces

Charlies Angels

Touched by an Angel

Angels in America

Angels are used to sell everything from cream cheese to lingerie.   We think of angels getting their wings, and we think of them as being cute and bumbling, like Clarence in It’s a Wonderful Life.   It may well be that there are more people who believe in angels than there are people who believe in Jesus, which, if so,  isn’t surprising, because where as Jesus makes demands on his followers, angels in popular belief often seem like fairy godmothers.

So what if anything are we as followers of Jesus supposed to think about angels?   While they are mysterious, angels are in scripture and in the teachings of the church, and so we can say a few things about them.  We can start by saying that they are created by God who made the heavens and the earth.  So they like us in that they are creatures; they are not gods and we are not meant to worship them.    Unlike us, they are spiritual beings who are able to live in the presence of God, but they also have the ability to move between spiritual existence and material existence, which is why they can appear to humans as God’s messengers.   Indeed, the word angel comes from a Latin word meaning messenger.

The psalmist describes angels as “mighty ones who do his bidding, and hearken to the voice of his word” (Ps 103: 20).   The word “mighty” explains why angels can be terrifying when they choose to be seen, while the phrase “do his bidding” tells us that angels are obedient to God’s will and are agents of God’s purposes.  And God’s purposes for us are good and loving, which is why the first thing angels usually say in scripture is “don’t be afraid”, which tells us that their role is to bring us closer to God who wants to save us.

While the work of angels is largely invisible, we get a glimpse of their work in our first reading (Genesis 28:10-17), Jacob’s vision of angels ascending and descending the ladder from heaven to hearth, leads us to think that there are many angels (see also Matthew 26:53, when Jesus refers to “twelve legions of angels”.  So why are all these angels going back and forth between heaven and earth?    We don’t know, but if the holy angels exist to do God’s bidding, and if God’s wants to save us, then surely it’s safe to say that the angels are working on our behalf.

In a fascinating podcast, Fr. James Brent says that the work of the angels is to draw us closer to Christ.  Anything that prompts us to pray, any impulse that leads us to an act of charity, he says, might be an angelic influence.  Likewise, Fr. Brent suggests that the idea of the guardian angel is not just a childish story, but has a wholesome purpose that we should take to heart, because as the story of St. Michael suggests, angels can be seen as protectors.

Angels are thus opposed to the demonic forces who try to undo the work of God and who seek to pull us away from God.   Who or what is the demonic?  It’s something we should take seriously, but not live in fear of.  I’ve always liked what C.S Lewis said, which is that it’s a mistake to think too much or too little about the forces of evil.   But if we agree that evil exists as a force or power in the world, then we can also say that angels exist to help God save us from these forces.  The story of St Michael in our second lesson is an example of how the angels serve God’s primary purpose, which is to resist evil and death.  Jesus consistently opposes the forces of evil.  In Mark’s gospel, Jesus’ first miracle is to free a man from an evil spirit.   Christ wishes that all of us are freed from the power of evil and death, and the angels exist in part to bring us closer to Christ.

I realize that much of what I have said may seem esoteric and far-fetched.  The idea of our world busy with invisible, divine activity is difficult for a materialist mindset to accept, and almost as difficult for those who see God as being far-off and detached from the world God made.  But why would a God who made the world out of love, and who wants what is best for us, keep a distance from that world?  As Archbishop Rowan Williams has written, the possibility of angels remind us that created world is actually more mysterious that we can imagine, “pulsing with something unmanageable, terrible, and wonderful, just below its surface”.   And surely, if the world is full of God’s activity and full of God’s angelic agents, then should we not strive to care for it, as God’s angels care for us?

So in this homily, I have suggested that angels are part of the Christian story, that we glimpse them in scripture, and that they exist to help God in God’s work of saving us.   It’s not childish to believe in angels.  If the idea of a guardian angel comforts you, then embrace it, as part of your faith.   It’s okay to ask our angel for help when we don’t have the concentration to pray, and when are sad or in despair, we can ask our guardian angel to quiet our troubled minds and lead us back to Christ.  If that is a comforting idea for you, then I encourage you to take it to heart.  After all, if God loves us, and if God created the angels to help us, then the angels must also love us.

It is not childish to believe in angels.  Their existence is testified in scripture and in the teaching of the church.   We may not see them, but we can draw comfort in their presence as a sign of God’s commitment to us and of God’s involvement in our daily lives.  And, as a final thought, we can see them as role models, for if angels exist to protect us, to help us, and to guide us, then we can initiate their work by protecting, helping, and guiding others.   In that way we can serve and love God in our earthly realm, as the angels serve and love God in the spiritual realm, for God’s will for us is that, when we are raised on the last day and perfected, we too may become angelic.